The field of commercial business forms has shown continuous and rapid growth in recent years. This is particularly true in regard to forms used in mail correspondence. Commercially, this type of business form includes an outside envelope, one or more sheets of material within the envelope bearing information for the recipient such as billing invoices, data read-outs, and similar information. In many instances return materials are solicited from the recipient such as orders, payments and responses to request for information in general. For this purpose, it is desirable to enclose a return envelope. In this manner, a prompt response is encouraged with the convenience of the recipient in mind.
Naturally there is considerable difficulty in inexpensively and efficiently mass producing the envelope package. This is particularly true when consideration is given to the fact that all of the materials vary in size and generally contain a variety of different types of information. Thus, the components, such as the outside envelope, the return envelope, and any enclosed information bearing sheets must be formed, assembled and imprinted with general and personal information directed to individual recipients. Thus, maintaining registration between components is a concern.
Also, often the contents are put aside for awhile and papers become separated and some lost or misplaced. In opening the envelope and removing the contents sometimes some insert papers, such as a return envelope, are inadvertently overlooked and left in the outside envelope which is provided. This presents a further problem. The mailing received by the recipient should be easy to open and the contents easily removed.
Throughout the years, a variety of different systems have been devised for forming the envelope assembly. In general, the preferred method in regard to cost, efficiency, and quality of the resultant product involves forming the combination of outside envelopes, return envelopes and information sheets as a continuous serial web of assemblies which are easily detachable for individually mailing to recipients. With all the available high speed automated equipment, it is extremely important to maintain close control of the various sheets during the formation process. This is particularly true when indicia and information in general is placed on the various sheets. Registration between the sheets is extremely important so that the indicia is placed in the proper location.
With the advent of automated machines, rapid technological development has been made in envelope design and construction. One early development involved a continuous series of sealed, stuffed envelopes with the contents contained therein. Tear strips were provided on all four sides of the envelope and all of them were required to be removed in order for the contents to be extracted.
Another early approach involved in a single envelope construction with a possible insert enclosed. One sheet of paper was always folded and by means of the folds the internal envelope or insert sheet, but not both, would be placed inside the outer envelope. One tear strip was provided to hold the inner envelope in place and allow for its removal when torn. However, the construction involved strictly folds and did not employ pasted plies and clearly could not be adapted for continuous strip mass production.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,104,799 to Steidinger was an improvement to the above ideas and involved an assembly for a series of sealed stuffed envelopes. Steidinger utilized continuous form stationary assemblies of individually sealed envelopes, each containing inserts which are imprinted by means of spot carbons while enclosed in the sealed envelope, and manufactured from superimposed ply strips. The top ply comprises the business record and the underlying plies form the envelopes and their contents.
In the Steidinger assembly, the envelopes have a single tear strip, usually located on the left edge, by which the recipient opens the envelope. A thumb tab indentation allows him to remove the contents easily. Before being opened, these same tear strips anchor the contents of the envelope in place so that all forms are lined up in proper registration for printing. This single tear strip arrangement is accomplished in Steidinger by pre-cutting the insert strip in spaces corresponding to the top and bottom of the outer envelope, creating an insert web structure which allows the outer envelope to be glued together, while permitting up to three margins of the insert to be freed for easy opening. This approach solved difficulties encountered when dealing with prior developments which had clear shortcomings. For example, one such concept utilized a series connected envelope and check with spot carbons to imprint both a master and internal sheets as well as portions of an outer envelope. The envelope was positioned in a pocket on the underside of the assembly and required hand stuffing and sealing.
Many additional improvements have been made as the return mailing concept gained acceptance and its scope of use increases in the world.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,237,970; 3,437,259; 3,554,438; 3,854,654; 3,941,307; 3,941,308; and 3,981,435 relate to a series of improvements in the Steidinger type envelope generally including a serially arranged plurality of envelope assemblies with line holes in the control margins of the outer envelope.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,315,984 and 3,790,070 show the concept of a snap-out business form or insert.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,339,827; 3,411,699; and 3,777,971 deal with the concept of placing the insert in the pocket of an outer envelope. This shows the diversity of the development of the art as does U.S. Pat. No. 3,837,565 dealing with manifold type stuffed mailers.
Finally, with the computerization of many technologies, it is inevitable that computer printing should be utilized in the types of business envelope assemblies under consideration. Examples of recent development in this area are present in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,820,447; 4,000,916; and 4,113,281.
It is clear that the field of development is quite active and further improvements are warranted and desired.